The Tandala Safaris
Going into the park from Tandala is the only place on the
trip where we are having to pay separately for park entrance fees and our guide
and vehicle. It’s not a problem, as we knew to expect this and have all
budgeted for it somewhere along the line. At about £100 per day, it seems
expensive, but not so much in the greater cost of the whole trip.
I don’t think that we originally intended to go into the
park every day, but, in the end, that’s what we find ourselves doing. We are
perhaps making up for the slow and difficult start to the holiday.
We also have a bit more control over what we do and can keep
the days down to about five or six hours rather than eight or nine. We are also
about 20 minutes closer to the park gate, which helps a lot.
Safari Day One
Seven in the morning is plenty early enough to get up for
breakfast – we are now meant to be in the enjoy part of the experience. I think
we’ve all endured enough for now. Breakfast is excellent, although I’m toning
it back down to better enjoy my lunch and dinner.
We’re at the park entrance just past eight and the paperwork is dealt with swiftly. Soon we are following a similar route to our “Hilltop” day, moving reasonably quickly through the sparse birdlife and mammals of the first section of the park, southeast of the Great Ruaha River. Even here, though, there are a couple of nice birds to add to the list.
Our new guide, Daniel is pretty keen and it is clear fairly
soon that they have something in mind and are searching for a particular
species. What we find, after several minutes of searching little-used tracks
along the bank of the dry river-bed, are two youngish male lions. They are both
deeply – really deeply – asleep on the riverbank, one down on the sand and the
other just a couple of metres from us.
From our first angle, you’d swear they were corpses. I really
have to concentrate to see the movement of breathing. They are both very thin
and clearly not getting enough to eat. Lone males – still to find a pride of
females to take over – struggle to hunt as they are not as fast or agile as the
smaller females usually are.
Starting the car, to leave them in peace, rouses the nearest
one enough for him to sit up and look around, which gives us a great photo
opportunity and our first close-up lion of the trip. We only bother him for
another minute or so though, it looks like he needs the rest.
Deeper into the park and we have a truly wonderful elephant encounter. We watch as a group come up the riverbank and browse their way across in front of us, Ishmael the driver having placed us very close indeed. We normally wouldn’t worry too much about being very close, but the matriarch of the family has a very young infant at her feet – young enough to not be in total control of his trunk and therefore probably only a few months old. We had no cause for concern though, as mother seemed entirely at ease with us being less than five metres away. One or two of the older kids were a bit more boisterous, but limited themselves to waving trunks about and making a bit of a noise – nothing serious.
The park is varied, sometimes dense woodland, sometimes more
open, particularly down by the river. There is some game to be seen almost
anywhere, but never in high concentrations – the biggest groups might be a
dozen zebras or maybe a harem of 30 impalas. There do, however, seem to be
elephants anywhere and everywhere, either lone bulls or family groups moving to
or from water or browsing the lush grasses. We find plenty of giraffes and they
tend to be quite willing to be photographed, as long as we don’t get too close.
All the elephant encounters are really wonderful, whether it
is meeting a lone bull browsing or a family crossing the road, they all have
something unique to offer and we have the patience to sit and watch them for
the full experience. This is something that it’s important to make clear to
your driver or guide. We always tell them we are interested in everything –
mammals, reptiles, birds, insects. Even odd or colourful flowers are worth a
stop sometimes. I try and play down the birds a little, but Fred then
immediately calls “stop, stop!” at the first sight of anything with wings! It
is equally important to let them know that you aren’t afraid to just sit and
wait for stuff to happen and that you know how to keep quiet and behave
yourself.
We are heading slowly out of the park, looking for birds
near to the park headquarters, when Damien spots a leopard just sitting by the
road about 150m ahead of us. Before we can even get moving, it stands and walks
across the road. We try our best to get to the crossing point, but our quarry has
moved into the grass and shrubbery and for a few moments cannot be seen.
It appears again moments later and is clearly stalking a family of warthogs some way further from us. We never get a good clear view, it keeps to cover and despite our change of position, it manages to stay in partial cover. The warthogs seem to be curious about us, and this ruins the hunt when they first come close to see us clearly and then run too far away to be easy prey for a leopard ambush.
All in all, it is a good safari day that finishes early
enough for Chris and myself to relax in the pool for a few minutes to cool off
when we get back. Dinner is excellent once more and it gets cool enough to have
a reasonable night’s sleep.
Safari Day Two
Our second day starts at a similar time and follows many of
the same trails, but this time the lions are easier to find, being right by a
main track and with a couple of other vehicles around them. They are hardly any
livelier than on our first day, but at least – well, initially – they are both
sitting up to be photographed. We get tired of them at about the same time as
they get tired of us, so we head off in search of elephants and whatever else
we can find.
By early afternoon, we are far from the park entrance and the clouds are building ominously with a few rumbles of thunder. Sadly, we can see the rain that is coming our way but can do little to avoid it other than put raincoats on and try to get through it as quickly as possible. And it does indeed come – like only an African thunderstorm can – lashing us with a torrent that soon has the road like a river and us all at the very least a little damp despite the waterproofs.
It really does put a bit of a dampener – pun intended – on
this particular day. It clears soon, but we are all a bit miserable. Still keen
enough to enjoy a few more good elephants, but not perhaps as much as the day
before. This is the way of safari; every day is different and all days have
good bits and bad bits that must be taken as a whole before judging the whole
trip.
We make it to the picnic site with damp clothes and damp
spirits, but There is a bit of a surprise waiting for us there. Fred had
metioned to me in passing, a couple of weeks before we left the Island, that he
had been speaking to someone who was also coming to Tanzania at about the same
time as us.
Gary and Tanja were visiting many of the same parks that we
were and just happened to be at Ruaha Hilltop right after we left for Tandala.
With a little bit of organisation, we found ourselves at the same picnic site,
deep in the middle of Ruaha, for a quick lunch and a chance to compare notes.
To find others from our tiny island at the same spot in the
vastness of Africa, at the same time, is pretty spectacular. I guess more
people share my love of the safari experience than I ever thought possible.
I don’t take photos of people as a rule – I might be worried that they will take photos of me somewhere along the line, but occasionally I will get caught in a shot of the “team” when I can’t avoid it. Frankly, I look bloody awful in this one that Gary kindly sent via Fred. I’m going to blame it on a combination of being damp and having been bitten by dozens of tzetze so far on the day in question.
Safari Day Three
Our last full day at Tandala dawns warm and dry with clearer
skies and the early promise of a good day. We are blessed also with fewer
tzetze than on the last few days. I’m only bitten a couple of times on the
drive to the gate, then left alone for the rest of the day – heaven. Without
the tzetze, there would be no park, as only the threat of the fly can keep the
herds of cattle and their owners at bay.
The morning is pretty quiet, I haven’t seen an elephant by
noon, but we did manage to answer a call and get a lead to a couple of cheetahs
– they are already moving into cover as we approach, but we do manage to at
least see them. While trying to find them on the other side of a deep thicket,
we manage to spot a leopard instead – two cat species for the price of one.
Again, the view is short and poor, but any sighting is a fantastic experience.
The afternoon is better, there’s more game about and we have
a couple of fantastic elephant encounters. One family drinking at a pool
decides to cross right in front of us, with the youngsters unable to resist the
chance for a quick – and cooling – play in the water. Elephants in the water is
one of my favourite things and the camera is soon doing overtime to capture as
much as possible.
I’m always fascinated to see just how often one of the
elephants, once in the water even a little way, wants to play around. There’s
clearly some real fun element to all of this for them – not all elephants, as
I’ve seen elephants who really dislike the water, but a not insignificant
number.
A later group is spotted crossing the road in front of us
and get just slightly agitated at our presence – not dangerously so – as they
have young calves in the group. I think we just caught them a little by
surprise, coming round a corner and being suddenly right in the middle of an
area that the aunties on guard duty thought they had under better control.
With a driver and guide who know just how far they can trust
the wildlife, this sort of encounter is in no way threatening, just hugely
entertaining and enjoyable. For the most part – and I really am generalising a
lot here – elephants don’t want to harm you or themselves and more than 90% of
charges are just for show. The secret is to know when they really mean it – or
more particularly – when you’ve outstayed you welcome and get out of the way
before anything goes horribly wrong.